Is Faith Supernatural?
Faith that is not based on reason is not faith at all.
Faith is perceiving something to be likely to be
true with the eyes of reason.
Belief can be reasonable even if it is wrong. As long as you are going by the best light
you have it is reasonable for you, though not reasonable objectively, and as far
as reality is concerned. Belief can be
wrong.
The traditional Catholic doctrine about the relationship between faith
and reason is totally unacceptable. It
says that faith is reasonable and is a supernatural gift of God but if faith is
caused by our reason then it is not supernatural.
The famous, A Catechism of Christian Doctrine tells us that, “Faith is a supernatural gift of God, which enables us to believe without doubting whatever God has revealed” (page 4, Question 9). Supernatural gift is often referred to as grace. Grace is a magical gift from God. It can magically turn us into good people.
Religion erects faith on mysteries – on what appears to be contradictions
which it says are not contradictions.
Being unable to believe in the incoherent you can only do it by
magic. Religion has to teach that grace
is the cause of faith and not just logic.
But the two conflict and cannot endure one another.
Reason then is like a ladder that you use to get to
faith the gift. And once you have arrived at the top and reached the goal you dump the ladder. But if reason leads you to faith then by
abandoning reason then you forsake faith.
You are saying that reason is wrong which really denies the existence of
truth and if there is no truth there is no faith. If reason is just to be used to
psychologically prepare you for faith then you merely believe because you feel
it is all true. But you believe and know that
feelings do not mean that something is likely so this faith is a sham. Only a true bigot bases faith on feelings.
The curious religious notion of the relationship between reason and faith tells us that
faith is not about God revealing himself to you. It is about God revealing doctrines
or propositions to you. Some find fault
with it for that. But some say reason and emotion can be used by God to reveal himself to
you. How else is he going to do it? To experience God as love is to receive the
doctrine that he is love so there is no way one can get away from it.
The doctrine that faith is a gift from God is dangerous for it could lead
to dishonesty for those who wish to claim that the belief makes sense and could
lead to fanatical sectarianism for those who see that faith must be blind when
it refuses to be supported by reason.
It is unfair to use reason to get to faith and then to get rid of reason. If reason is right then one should
not start treating it as wrong when one thinks one has the gift of faith.
You never know when to push away the ladder for you never know if your
faith has attained the supernatural level yet or not or is supernatural
enough. The doctrine presupposes an
arrogant attitude that claims to know what God is doing or has done. All Christians feel that God has
supernaturally convinced them of something only to find out that he has not for
it turned out to be wrong.
If faith is the
goal then reason is inferior and deserving of less respect. If reason is the ladder to faith, one should force others to hear
the rational arguments for faith so that they can freely accept God’s gift of
faith. The history of the Churches is
littered with evidence that the Church believed it had the right to shove the
Bible and Church decrees down the throats of sceptics. To denigrate reason is to denigrate persons
for reason is the main part of being a person and without it there is no
liberty. If reason is bad so is
liberty. Read this again. Learn from it why you should not let religion
thrive.
They say that blind beliefs are right or should be believed. But if they ought to have beliefs that have
no foundation then everybody else should do the same and have different ones if
they want. Such faith is sheer arrogance
and bigotry. For one blind-believer to
say to another, “I command you in the name of God and on the authority of my
God to believe what I believe,” is to be a snob.
The Christian religion says that faith in it is a gift from God. God enables you to believe. But if you have free will then he does not
need to. And if you cannot believe
unless he does something to you then he has prevented you from believing before
that. He has forced you not to
believe. He has forced you to be wrong
and accordingly cannot be trusted.
Now how would God make a person who is free believe? If he shoves the will then he is forcing you
to be able to choose whether or not you will believe. But that means that you were not free to choose
to believe before that.
The notion of faith as a gift from God implies that we need God to give us faith. Christianity says faith needs to be a gift to be any good. Without God giving it, it means nothing.
So we don't have the free will to believe properly. God has to do the work for us and put the belief in us like it was a vitamin injection to the soul. Faith makes us more free. We must have had partial free will before. Or perhaps we could have believed but evilly didn’t want to.
God should be limiting the free will of men
like Hitler instead of trying to stop people from having the truth and its
benefits. If belief was resisted then
that idea can only fuel inter-religious strife.
For example, the Catholics will hate the Protestants if they think the
Protestants knowingly oppose Catholic truth for then it would follow that the
Catholics are being shot in Northern Ireland because of a system of religion that is not
even sincere and loves trouble. And vice
versa.
The doctrine that we need faith as a gift from God simply proves there is no God for it implies that human free will cannot be blamed for the evils in the world. The blame must be squarely placed at the feet of God. He left us unable to believe the truth by our own powers and reason meaning he is to blame for all the messes this results in.
BOOKS
CONSULTED
A Catechism of
Christian Doctrine, Catholic Truth Society,
A Common Faith, John Dewey,
A Primer of
Necessary Belief, Dawson Jackson ,Victor Gollancz
Ltd,
Apologetics and
Catholic Doctrine, M H Gill and Son Ltd,
Faith and Ambiguity,
Stewart R Sutherland, SCM Press,
God
and Philosophy,
In
Defence of the Faith, Dave Hunt, Harvest House, Eugene Oregon, 1996
On Being a Christian, Hans Kung, Collins/Fount Paperbacks,
Reason and Belief, Bland Blanschard,
Reason and Religion, Anthony Kenny, Basil Blackwell Ltd,
The Balance of Truth, EI Watkin,
Hollis & Carter,
The Case Against
Christ, John Young, Falcon Books,
The Faith of a Subaltern, Alec de Candole,
Cambridge University Press, 1919
The Fundamental Questions of Philosophy, A.C.
The Future of Belief Debate, Ed Gregory Baum, Herder and Herder,
The Student’s
Catholic Doctrine, Rev Charles Hart BA, Burns & Oates,
Unblind Faith, Michael J Langford, SCM,
What Do Existentialists
Believe? Richard Appignanesi,
Granta Books,
What is Christianity? Very Rev W Moran DD, Catholic Truth Society
of
What is
Faith? Anthony Kenny,
THE WEB
THE PROBLEMS WITH BELIEFS www.nobeliefs.com/beliefs.htm